A funny thing happened on the way to Louisiana

Even though I have not mentioned it in a while, we still have a house at Ft. Polk. Yep. The really stand-up folks who signed a contract to purchase it almost 2 years ago backed out. Awesome. Well, we had not seen the house since I left there in September of 2008. We assumed that all was well. Our wonderful realtor has found someone to cut the grass, but as far as maintenance and up-keep, well, there hasn't been any. So my husband, who sometimes stops by our house for a visit, decided that it was time for someone to go to see it in person. So on a rare week where he was not scheduled to travel, he loaded up his cute little Volvo Sedan and started out for Leesville. He was keeping me posted throughout his 11 hour drive. And when he was just outside of Shreveport, the last big city on his journey, his clutch started acting funny. He decided to keep on going.

He eventually made it to the house and checked it out. He said it didn't seem too serious. So he went on about his business. Lots of landscaping and sprucing up to be done all over the property. Carpets were cleaned. Toilets were scrubbed. Multiple trips to Lowe's and Wal-Mart were made. And through it all, his cute little Volvo kept on going.

Then the night before he was set to drive back, he called with some bad news. He could not even get it to go into gear. Uh-oh. Now what?! He called Volvo's 1-800 number and they agreed to send a tow truck to tow it to the closest dealer. In Shreveport. 90 miles away. Now David is in Leesville with no car. Oh, and it was the Thursday before Labor Day weekend. There were no rental cars in Leesville. At all. AND he had tons of equipment with him, like a lawn mower, a seed spreader thing, a weedeater, a tiller, a shovel, a rake, lots of tools, etc. So he had to take a cab to Alexandria's airport to rent a car. He then drove the rental car back to Leesville and loaded up all the stuff. The next morning, he drove to Shreveport and dropped off the equipment in his car at the Volvo dealer on his way to the airport to fly home to St. Louis. And the Volvo service people couldn't even look at it until the Tuesday after Labor Day. Awesome.

So we spent the week with only 1 car. Luckily he has some cool people at work who gave him rides so that I did not have to add yet another person in need of a chauffeur to my rotation. He then planned to fly back to get the car the next Saturday. On Friday, he called the service people who assured him it was ready to go for him to pick it up on Saturday morning.

He flew from St. Louis to Atlanta. He flew from Atlanta to Shreveport. He took a taxi to the dealer. The dealer said, "Uh, I tried to call you, but it isn't ready." WHAT?! Are you kidding??
Now what?
We thought about all the many options.
Rent a car and drive? Fly back?
When can he make it back to Shreveport?

David said not to worry.
He said he'd figure something out.

Well, he did.

Yep. He traded that baby and drove home in a NEW Volvo.

Bless his heart.
I think he planned it.

Just look at that face.